Shawn Miller Meets Adrian “The Shark” Diaconu

Our local fighters are getting some incredibly valuable experience these days.

First, Mikey Faragon travelled to Coney Island this past week to go seven rounds with Paulie Malignaggi. Now, at 10:00 a.m. this morning (Saturday) in Altona, NY, our own Shawn Miller will step into the ring with former WBC light heavyweight champion, Adrian “The Shark” Diaconu (26[15 KOs] – 1), who is getting ready for his December 11 re-match against reigning champion, Jean Pascal (24 [16 KOs] – 1). Pascal dethroned the Shark on June 19, handing him the only loss of his career. There’s no small irony here. This past September, Shawn went a few rounds with Pascal.

This is how fighters get better, folks. Like Mikey Faragon, Shawn’s not content to be just a big frog in a small pond. In a few hours, he’s going to taste greatness again and grow from the experience.

But let’s not sell Shawn short. Diaconu isn’t just doing him a favor. The Romanian superstar, who fights out of Montreal, has too much on his mind right now (READ: Pascal) to do Shawn favors. And his sparring time is very valuable. He’s doing this because he knows Shawn can give him good work.

So here’s what Shawn and I decided to do. We’ll talk later today or tomorrow and he’ll give me an account of the whole experience, a sort of round by round report of what it was like to be in there with arguably one of the greatest fighters in the world right now. And I’ll tell you about it right in this space.